Hi,

I'm trying to figure out what is going on with my kitchen sink, which is completely clogged for the second time in three months. Some background on the house: 11 year old spec build, I am the second owner. I've lived here for 1.5 years and during the first year of living here, I had no issues with the kitchen sink. The sink first became clogged 3 months ago. I tried the usual novice steps (Draino, a hand snake) which failed. I had a plumber come by who couldn't reach the clog with his snake (25 feet) and referred me to another plumber, who did unclog the sink but it took him a while and he said the clog was deep and he needed to use his 50 foot snake. This plumber advised that I not use the garbage disposal on the sink and be very careful to ensure no food particles or grease go down there, because the sink piping had such a long distance to go to the main sewer line and wasn't tied into any bathroom plumbing as I have no bathrooms on that side of the house. My house has 5 bathrooms, but they are all either on the left side of my home or in the middle, and my kitchen is on the right side of the home.

So, I've been super neurotic about the sink for the past 3 months. I have a sink strainer that sits over the hole to prevent any food particles from falling down. No grease goes down it etc. And yet here I am 3 months later and the sink is completely clogged again. I tried Green Gobbler's gallon bottle of main line and drain opener and let it sit overnight, but it has no effect.

I am prepared to call out another plumber, but this is getting expensive and I'm concerned something bigger is going on. I spoke to a friend who's a handyman (not a plumber), and he speculated that perhaps the pitch of the plumbing isn't right (in which case I'd need to rip out the basement ceiling and walls to fix, ugh) or the first plumber only partially cleared the clog (but I did run the water for 10 minutes after he came and it ran fine). I'm still not sure why I had no problems with the sink for my first year of living here, though. I do have hard water and no water softener (not sure if that is relevant). Any thoughts on this situation would be so helpful, thank you.



Edited 1 times.

Get a balloon at the big box store and insert it into the pipe vent from the roof or a clean out if available and push it all the way in and turn on the water full blast. If roots aren't the problem you may clear the blockage. If that doesn't work call for a camera and have the guy snake it again with the proper length and size of snake.

srloren

if it's about 40-50ft from your kitchen to your front yard then I would suspect root penetration. Check the end of the snake next time for clues.